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TROJSKÝ ZÁMEK
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The City Gallery Prague has installed its collection of l9th century
Czech painting at Troja Chateau, put at the Gallery's disposal in 1989
following a substantial reconstruction of the building and grounds. In
1998 Gallery, after almost ten years, to put in place a new exhibition
of Czech l9th century painting. Thanks to this new concept visitors will
not only get a more detailed picture of this period, but also a wealth
of information - captions, comments on the 216 paintings and 11
sculptures and concise biographies of the artists are an integral part
of the exhibition. The Gallery's collection does not provide a comprehensive picture of l9th century painting - its chief attraction lies in the choice of artists and the specific links of the artists or exhibited works with Prague. In this respect it is somewhat different from other collections of l9th century Czech painting. The City of Prague owned works of art already in the last century - paintings, sculptures, drawings and engravings, works by contemporaneous artists, bought by the municipality. In addition, this collection grew thanks to donations and bequests, which in many instances have a fascinating history. As, however, entire periods were missing in this collection, the gaps - certain trends in art and their representatives - were filled with borrowings from the National Gallery in Prague and the West-Bohemian Gallery in Plzeň. The result is a comprehensive picture of the development of Czech art in the past century. The new concept respects the specific traits and choice of artists of the City Gallery of Prague's collection. These special features include the portrait gallery of all l9th century Prague Lords Mayors, Jaroslav Čermák's paintings donated by Mrs. Hippolyte Gallait and the estate of Václav Brožík. In the 20th century the municipality continued to buy, as before, many works of art; it also received many gifts, in some instances large sets of paintings - one of the largest are the twenty monumental paintings of the Slavic Epopee, donated in October 1928 by Alfons Mucha and Charles R. Crane to "the Czech people and the city of Prague". This would, however, bring us to works outside the period covered by the Troja exhibition. We should, however, mention some recent donations. Shortly after November 1989 the Prague City Gallery received from the German art collector Herrmann Schnabel a painting by Václav Brožík. In 1993 Mrs. Věra Třebická-Řivnáčová, who now lives in Mexico, gave the Gallery several l9th and 20th century paintings - only a painting by Antonín Chittussi and another by Mikoláš Aleš could be included in the present exhibition, being the only ones strictly belonging to the l9th-century. In the ten rooms at Troja Chateau set aside for the exhibition visitors will find, at least in concise form, the development of Czech painting in the l9th century, its reactions to artistic trends elsewhere in Europe, its reflection of Czech history and life in the capital Prague. Moreover, the exhibition indicates fairly well the significance of the l9th century for the subsequent development of the arts. Naděžda Blažíčková-Horová (modified) |
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